


Ex Machina

by girlskylark



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Artificial Intelligence, Artificial Intelligence, EX Machina AU, F/F, For Ashley :D, For Science!, Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy References, Pining, Robot/Human Relationships, Robots, Science Experiments, Science Fiction, Unethical Experimentation, pining pidge
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-17
Updated: 2018-02-14
Packaged: 2019-02-16 02:49:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 16,127
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13044945
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/girlskylark/pseuds/girlskylark
Summary: Pidge is selected to participate in a once-in-a-lifetime event that would go down as the single most incredible scientific invention in the history of mankind. Although... under strict confidentiality, she swears to never speak of the events, and likely never will after all is said and done.[ Christmas present for my friend Ashley, a fanfiction fiend and a hella suave beta ]





	1. a l l u r a

Pidge couldn’t tell you much about the days leading up to her departure. Quite honestly, she couldn’t tell you a single thing until the day she set foot across the great expanse of concrete separating her from the helicopter that would fly her to her destination. She couldn’t tell you the name of the pilot, or what she even brought with her—later, she would regret that. Packing for a week in an unknown location was simply impossible and required a lot more thought than she put into it. For one, she hadn’t expected the climate to drop to comfortable fall temperatures when they glided past the mountainous terrain. It was with pure luck that she rarely wore shorts and therefore, didn’t need to worry about freezing _too_ terribly.

“How long until we get to the estate?” she asked the pilot through the com unit. 

The pilot glanced at her as if she was joking, and she heard his muffled laughter in her headphones. “We’ve _been_ flying over the estate for the past two hours,” he said. 

_As if I would know that_ , she thought to herself bitterly as she rolled her eyes towards the passenger window. She supposed only a handful of people _really_ knew where the founder of Empire lived his life in luxury—this pilot being one of the lucky few. She speculated about where such enormous fortune might settle itself, and didn’t expect “mountains” to be on the list. From what she knew of Alon Lotor, the man seemed to appreciate frequent trips to _Hawaii_. But perhaps that was just a lookalike trying to tap into the attention that Lotor culminated. Pidge wouldn’t be surprised if that was the case, considering just how unfriendly and introverted the man tended to be in professional interviews. 

_Too high and mighty for us mortals_ , she thought with a laugh, only to hesitate when the helicopter began to descend. 

She straightened in her seat, expecting to see the mansion from here, but the pilot directed her elsewhere as they hopped down from the helicopter door. 

“This is as close as I can get you!” he shouted over the blades whirring above their heads. Pidge held her mess of hair back with a hand flat over her forehead. “Follow the river upstream—his house is just on the edge of it!”

“Thank you!” she said, passing him the headphones before ducking to escape the surge of air the helicopter let out as it lifted off into the sky again.

She stood up straighter and realized that her hair was in the way and only getting worse at this point. She hitched her backpack straps up onto her shoulders and promptly yanked her headband off of her wrist. She tied it securely so that hair could stay put for once, and continued down the overgrown path alongside the riverbank. _Good thing I wore boots_ , she thought, and wondered if it was terrible of her to follow through with her Professional Strike on such a day. She hadn’t worn a decent blazer since her freshmen year of college when she learned to Give Up On Appearances. 

But now she was a college graduate with a programming job at Empire, preparing to meet the founder of it all—the genius who coded the entire system from scratch when he was just a thirteen year old boy living in his parents’ house. She couldn’t tell you just how brilliant this man was, or just how excited she was to meet him. Both of those things were immeasurable—unless, of course, she was plotting to write a thorough thesis seeking to accurately estimate his brilliance as it related to her childish amazement. Later, she might discover a recorded history in her text conversations between her and her best friend Hunk attempting to quantify it, but… that was for another day that didn’t exist.

Her boots found solid ground a few minutes later as she passed under the canopy of pine trees. The stone pathway guided her to the entrance of what appeared to be a solid metal front—a metallic box in the midst of nature. She hesitated to pass a hand over it, realizing quickly that this was just like every other fantasy she had about her future house. If only she could live like a billionaire with secret passages behind every wall, and seemingly nonexistent doorways.

“Um…” she started, stopping at the end of the walkway and turning back. Still no sight of a door. “Hello?” she called out, leaning to the side to look around the corner. The building was raised up on a slight platform, so the side of the house was above the forest floor. 

“ _Please approach the screen_.”

The calm, engaging voice spoke from absolutely nowhere, and so Pidge looked around once again before noting a blue light illuminating through the metal. She walked up to it, raising an eyebrow as she leaned in to see where the light came from. It almost looked like a reflection of her f—

A camera flash went off, momentarily blinding her. She stepped back, blinking hard. She willed the black dots to subside as the system spoke to her again.

“ _Please use your new keycard to enter the premises. Hold it in front of any blue sensor to activate surface controls_ ,” the voice said, and a slot opened to produce a chrome slip.

Pidge grimaced as she realized her face was now printed on it. 

“Uh, thanks. I guess,” she said weakly, certain that her expression looked far worse now than it did in the surprise picture. She took the card and waved it in front of the blue light. It let out a happy little bleep, which did little to suppress her disappointment in her picture. It just proved that she didn’t look flattering at all moments of the day, and she had solid evidence of it on her Forever Card that wouldn’t likely disappear any time soon from _Alon Lotor’s system_. 

Her footsteps echoed quietly from the foyer. Her gaze went to the wall fitted against the edge of the cliff with the rocks exposed, and then to the accented wood furniture and the purely glass walls. She watched her reflection pass through a mirror and realized for the umpteenth time that day how _insanely_ cool this was. 

She didn’t exactly expect a fanfare or anything of that sort upon her arrival, but she _did_ expect some guidance. Instead, she wandered the halls calling out, “Hello? Hel _looo_ …” every now and then before climbing the steps to what appeared to be the kitchen.

Distantly, she heard the sound of someone’s ragged breaths. Seeing as she wasn’t exactly one for exercise, her first thought took her downhill, thinking, “Okay, not going near _that_ can of worms,” but the windows separating the kitchen from the deck reassured her that it was just someone working out on the deck. 

She let out a breath of relief and stepped through the door. It didn’t take long for her to recognize the man as the one on all the magazines. Except, for once he wasn’t in that same ratty suit he always wore to shoots and interviews and refused to change against all the pleads of the stylists. The only thing that ever changed about him was how he wore his infamous long, pure white hair. For a man barely over twenty-five, his hair was so blonde it was white, and he had it tied back in a loose, sagging bun that fell between his shoulder blades as he paused mid-swing at the punching bag.

His eyes caught on Pidge’s.

“Am I… interrupting something?” she asked awkwardly, grinning as she offered a partial wave to none other than her new boss for the week to come.

“Is it really noon? I lost track of the time,” Lotor said, unwinding the wraps from his hands before reaching one out to shake her’s. “It’s a pleasure finally meeting you, Katie. I am honestly thrilled to be working with you.”

Pidge flushed despite all her attempts not to. “I—um, I should really be the one saying that. And you can just call me Pidge—everyone sort of… does.”

“Pidge?” he repeated, perfectly manicured eyebrow raising. _Damn_ , she had never seen such flawless eyebrows in her entire life. “Peculiar nickname. I like it. Are you hungry at all?”

He walked past her, back into the kitchen where she followed and tucked her hands against the straps of her backpack. “Uh, not especially. I ate before the flight over so…”

“Perfect then. We can get straight to work. We’ve only got a week together so we might as well make the most of it,” he declared. Pidge tried her best to look casual, and ended up awkwardly leaning against the kitchen table in the time it took for Lotor to pour himself a smoothie and turn back around to face her. 

They studied one another for a moment, and Pidge started sweating. She was beside herself with nerves that she could barely comprehend herself. It was one thing to view Lotor from the lens of thousand-dollar cameras used to capture pictures of him on the covers of magazines and advertisements, but this was _different_. He didn’t look nearly as intimidating as she thought he would. In fact, he was quite underwhelming as a specimen in general.

His gnarly suit seemed to accentuate his otherwise normal shoulders, and his lack bulky muscles. He was all limbs—tall, lean, but fit all the same. Immediately after a workout, though, his muscles were defined when he tipped his glass up to drink from it—still showing a glimmer of sweat. 

He lowered the cup and said, “Could we maybe not do this weird awkward silence?”

She gawked at him, as if to say, _Excuse me?_ but checked herself before saying it out loud.

“I mean—I don’t mind silences in general, just with people who aren’t strangers. Are we strangers?”

“I mean… not technically,” she confessed, and the idea had her relaxing a bit. “You’ve probably done your research on me, so you know me. And I know you just from… working at Empire.”

“Perfect. Then let’s skip all that and aim for friends, yeah? Let me show you around. I can’t say I’m much of a tour guide, though—I haven’t done this much,” he confessed, and wandered off as if in search of something. Pidge stayed put before belatedly realizing that he expected her to follow.

“Oh—the tour’s starting now?”

“Yes, come on.”

“Oh, okay, sorry—I just—it looked like—I’ll stop talking,” she babbled, hurrying to catch up as he turned a corner away from her.

He finished off his smoothie as they walked through the sitting area, which he described as, “The lounge. Don’t use it often—kind of meaningless.”

“The lounge?”

“Yes, because of that chair there. Looks lounge-y, doesn’t it?” he said, kicking the leg of the chaise lounge before moving on.

“I suppose you could say that…” she said, and gave the cushion an experimental push before she was dragged along to a pool area.

“I call it the spa,” he said.

“The spa?”

“Yes, because I like spas and I don’t have an actual one. This suffices,” he said, and together they crossed their arms and tipped their heads, gazing through the door he kept open with his foot. When he released the door of its duties, he looked at her with an amused sort of look on his face. She raised an eyebrow at him as he continued on, and realized that they had already discovered a few of their shared mannerisms. 

Up until then, Lotor had been swiping his own key over doors here and there until landing at a flat surface on the wall, only distinguishable by the blue light reflecting through.

““Your pass opens some doors and doesn’t open others—makes the whole scenario easier for you. If it doesn’t open—off limits—and if it does, it’s for you. Doorhandles give me the willies so I just got rid of them completely,” he confessed.

“Sounds dangerous.”

“Not really. The system is incredibly reliable, and no handles means less germs to worry about,” he said, wiggling his fingers about before moving on. “You should have gotten a keycard when you came in.”

She produced it from her pocket, and forgot to be embarrassed about it until Lotor plucked it out of her fingers. “Any door this opens is for you, so you don’t have to worry about getting lost in places you shouldn’t be. Here, test it out.”

He passed the card back. Just like every other sentence with “shouldn’t” in it, Pidge got weird vibes and tried to keep them off of her face as she lifted the card up to the blue light. It let out another pleasant bleep, and the door opened with nothing more than a whisper. “This room must be for you then,” Lotor said, gesturing gracefully for Pidge to enter.

She pretended to be flattered and wandered in. It was a simple bedroom with all the necessities, including a bathroom (to pee in), a shower (to shower in), a bed (to sleep in), and a refrigerator that housed approximately as much water as she would normally drink voluntarily in an entire year. Her liquid diet mainly consisted of coffee anyways. Lotor went through a vague tour of the place before ending on a remote placed on the vast empty space above the mini fridge. 

“As you’ve probably noticed, your phone won’t work well here. You know, secret stuff I can’t tell you and all that,” he said, tossing her the remote. “This should suffice for taking up your free time. I’m pretty sure you can find some games or whatever on the TV.”

“What TV,” she said with a slight laugh, thinking he was joking.

She pressed the ON button, and leapt with a start when the wall across from her bed lit up. The _entire_ wall. 

“ _That_ TV,” he said. “I don’t have cable, but I believe _Netflix_ is an option. That’s like TV, right?”

“Are you serious? You’ve never been on Netflix before,” she said, and he waved a dismissive hand at the idea. She watched him walk out of the room, and let her backpack slip from her shoulders as she stared after the man in awe. _What an absolute legend_ , she thought, and hurriedly dumped her things off in the room before racing after him. 

“What would you say is the most important thing to know about a new friend?” he asked her, pausing in the hallway. 

“Is this a test or just a casual question.”

He thought for a moment. “Both.”

“Then I’d say tea or coffee,” she confessed, mostly because she hadn’t had a cup all day. From what she could recall, she was too nervous that morning to even consider making a batch before leaving her apartment. 

Lotor squinted his eyes skeptically at her. He pointed to himself. “Tea.”

“Coffee.”

“Excellent, because I have both and I never know what to do with the coffee,” he said. “They keep bringing the damn stuff like I’m tricking them when I say I don’t like it.”

“Who’s ‘they’?”

“Oh, just the guys who organize the food shipments. I don’t exactly have a grocery store nearby,” he explained, guiding them back to the kitchen. Apparently, her passive-aggressive request was answered, because he started pulling down a bag of coffee grounds from a cabinet. He asked what kind of music she liked—they both loved the same genres. She found it odd that she could have been randomly selected out of his thousands upon thousands of employees, especially when it was starting to sound like they were one in the same.

And she thought to herself, _Even if I wasn’t gay, I wouldn’t be able to date him. It’d be like dating myself_.

As he passed her a mug of coffee, the music he told the system to play swayed in the background. “So What is it that I’m here for, exactly? There weren’t many details,” she said, and breathed a sigh of relief when she took her first sip of coffee. The strong stuff.

“Ah,” he said, in the sort of way someone would snap their fingers to it. “You see, I can’t tell you. Not right now, anyways. We’ve got to cover one more base before getting started.”

“Really? I thought we were already past that friendship base,” she said teasingly, as if “second base” was an option for a lesbian and a man she just met. Of course it wasn’t.

Lotor searched around in the drawers on the island counter before producing a stack of papers. Pidge resisted the urge to sigh—a confidentiality contract. Of course. He laid it out in front of her and said, “Just this and we’ll be set to go.”

She took an experimental glance at it before looking up at him. He moved back to the counter and leant against it, arms crossed. With a sigh, she moved back to the packet and started to read through it. She wasn’t exactly a lawyer, but she knew when she needed one, and this was one of those times. _But this is Alon Lotor we’re talking about—founder of the Empire? Ring a bell?_ her mind told her, and it overpowered every doubt she had in her mind about this. Big whoop that she’d have to keep quiet—she didn’t talk about her personal life much at all with her coworkers, and the only person she’d have to _really_ worry about was Hunk badgering her over what she did for Lotor on her week long trip to the middle of buttfuck nowhere.

She flipped through the pages and found the signature line. If all else failed, she could regret it later. For now, her life was Lotor’s for the week under the terms of this nondisclosure agreement.

Still, she hesitated.

“You look concerned. It’s just a standard contract to ensure that your involvement won’t be detrimental to my research—that you won’t talk of it outside of the estate.”

Pidge combed a hand over her tangled ginger hair, and pulled her headband out in the process. “Yeah, well, it doesn’t seem very standard to me.”

Lotor stood straighter and walked over, saying, “You don’t technically _have_ to sign it. And the week will be a vacation for you. We could go hiking—explore a little.” He hesitated, leaning against the table and studying Pidge with his unwavering blue eyes. They were just as pale as his hair. “And… a year from now when the world knows about my research, you’ll regret not being a part of it for the rest of your life.”

Pidge couldn’t draw her eyes away from his until her resolve was clear. She signed her name.

Lotor took the contract from her and folded it neatly in half. He took a sharp breath of air in, preparing to speak, but he waited until the contract was securely stored away in one of the locked drawers. “Have you heard of Turing?” he asked.

Pidge blinked in surprise and laughed as she said, “ _Thee_ Alan Turing? Of course I’ve heard of him—Turing was a shining light in the world of science. He’s always been an idol to me.”

Lotor’s lips turned up into a slight smile as he added, “So then you’ve heard of the Turing Test before.”

“I—Yes, of course I have. It… shows a machine’s ability to exhibit humanistic behavior and intelligence—the test is only passed if the human doesn’t realize they’re interacting with a computer. _Passing_ the test means… that the computer has artificial intelligence and—are… you building an _AI?_ ” she said, and just watching his amusement climb was enough to confirm it. 

“I’ve already built one.”

Her hands flew up to her hair, pulling at it in excitement as she breathed, “Holy shit.”

“I know,” he laughed. “And your part in all of this is to be my human component in the test. How does that sound?”

She could barely breathe, let alone speak, and so her words came out in a mere squeak, “That sounds incredible.”

“It is. It really is,” he laughed. “How would you like to meet her?”

 

**A L L U R A : S E S S I O N 1**

* * *

 

 

Pidge really had no expectations about who “she” was. Until now, with all of her studies, the Turing Test was limited solely to a computer on which the evaluator would communicate with the subject. A machine’s ability to verbally speak wasn’t part of the test—that wasn’t the point of it. Nor was the point to evaluate _how_ the computer wrote, and whether or not it was in the format of casual human dialect. If that was the case, most Turing Tests would fail—as if they already haven’t—because machines weren’t complex enough to adapt casual human conversation into their linguistic database. 

She was just as excited to message an AI as she was to meet one as her keycard let her in through the evaluating room. 

Her chest was a bundle of nerves as she pushed into the room, using the flat surface of the door to steady herself. Her eyes searched the room for the computer, but instead, she found herself encased in a glass box with the door quietly shutting behind her. She looked back at it, and then again to the walls surrounding her. She was in a bubble within a room—a living room, to be precise. There was a couch on the other side, and chairs, and a hallway leading off to a separate room. Through an archway, she could see sunlight peering in from above, illuminating a garden of exotic trees and massive elephant leaves. 

Her attention when to the circular microphones on the glass, and then to the speakers above her. Her eyes drifted towards the security camera that was turned to face her. She offered it a meager wave, and wondered if Lotor was laughing at her from the other end. She probably looked as ridiculous giddy as any school kid on Christmas morning.

She went back to the microphone, and became interested in a bizarre web cutting across the plexiglass. The epicenter of the damage was dented in, towards Pidge, and despite how she ran her fingers over it, she felt no bumps, and no impact aside from wonder as to how it got there. When her hand touched the glass, she expected the same thing to happen as the television in her room—for the wall to turn into a screen with which she would communicate with Lotor’s AI. 

As she was expecting it, a movement passed at the corner of her vision, and her attention returned once more to the center of the room, where she watched someone duck away from the archway.

“Hello?” she said in alarm, stepping away from the glass. 

The figure peered around the corner again, this time giving Pidge a clear view of her long… _long_ white hair that fell over her shoulder. Pidge was momentarily distracted by her facial complex that she didn’t immediately see the fact that her hand was attached to what appeared to be a transparent exoskeleton exposing machinery on the inside. _Elegant_ machinery, with minimal excess cords and graciously spun wires that tied to the hinge joint of her elbow, and then to the shoulder concealed by her white hair that stopped at her part. Where her hair would have been on the right side, it was replaced with transparent skin exposing the gentle blue glow underneath. 

The woman stepped away from the archway, and Pidge’s jaw dropped.

Every part about her was like this—her hands looked entirely human, as did her feet, and a band of sensory material stretched across her breasts and hips, covering her modesty up to her neck, and then to the human flash of her dark complexion. She stayed at a distance, stepped towards the corridor where she hugged the wall with both hands tucked behind her.

They studied one another, and Pidge tried her best to look unfazed, but _damn_ was that hard when she was so incredibly stunned by Lotor’s machine’s beauty. But then again, Pidge supposed that if she had to create an AI, she, too, would have made one as beautiful as this.

“Hello,” the woman said, her voice tentative as she examined Pidge from her feet to her face. Her voice carried the subtle lilt of an accent—something she shared with Lotor. Clearly not as oafish as some might consider an American accent.

“Hi,” Pidge said, trying to hold back her smile and failing. _God_ , she sounded like a crazed school girl. She cleared her throat. “How are you?”

The woman raised an eyebrow at her, and it seemed to come so naturally to her, like she did it a thousand times before to Lotor. “How am I?” she repeated.

Pidge cringed internally. “Oh, sorry, that wasn’t—you don’t have to answer that, I guess,” she said, floundering for a moment before realizing that her awkwardness prompted the woman to release her hold on the wall and move closer. “My name is Pidge.”

The woman walked purposefully, but with all the elegance of a queen with her hands still clasped behind her. “Nice to meet you, Pidge,” she said.

“Do… you have a name? What can I call you?” she asked.

“I do—you may call me Allura,” she said, her curiosity drawing her closer to the glass where Pidge could hardly breathe. “I’ve never seen anyone other than Alon. What are you doing here?”

“I…” Pidge started, and wondered what exactly would make this test a success. Even now, Pidge hoped _desperately_ that she would get to see Allura pass. She decided with, “I’m here to learn more about you.”

Allura glanced down for a moment, and then up again. Pidge stepped closer to the glass, smiling as she realized that faint, glowing lights were dotted beneath her eyes. They were grouped in sets of three—six total. From far away, it was impossible to tell. And now, with neither of them clinging to the security of their opposite walls, they were able to explore the intricacies of their faces. Allura was crafted with such precision that every sculpted part of her face was completely in synch with what Pidge considered normal for a human. For a moment, she forgot that Lotor must have been the one to decide what freckles went where.

“What do you want to know about me?” Allura asked.

Pidge tucked her hands into her pockets and shrugged, “Whatever you’d like to tell me. I want to know what you’ll decide to say.”

“Oh,” she hummed, turning to pace down the length of Pidge’s enclosed box. If anything, Allura was freer now than Pidge was—Allura had the expanse of her entire room to roam, and Pidge was captive under her analytical gaze. Allura addressed Pidge again from her new angle, and said, “Well… you know my name. You see that I am not human, you know my creator is Alon.” 

“I do. Very observant of you,” Pidge said with a soft laugh.

Allura hesitated for a moment, staring at a wall before looking at Pidge accusingly, “You just made fun of me.”

Pidge turned pink despite herself. “I—Not _deliberately_.”

“You did though.”

“ _Not_ deliberately.”

“You made fun of me.”

“Oh my God, it was a joke,” Pidge said, looking everywhere but Allura before she caught the smile on Allura’s face. “So mean! You did that on purpose.”

Allura hesitated a moment before shrugging, and the casual act of it had Pidge laughing all over again. “Okay, okay. I’ll stop being sarcastic,” Pidge promised.

“I don’t mind your sarcasm,” Allura admitted, walking back over to where Pidge’s feet seemed to stick to the floor. “Alon programmed me to—”

“—Understand sarcasm,” Pidge finished, adding, “Sarcasm requires a high level of understanding. Color me impressed.”

“Is it because humans who use sarcasm involves the collective work of multiple parts of the brain?” she asked. “Because it was relatively easy to understand your sarcasm when coupled with your eye-roll.”

“Did I really roll my eyes?”

“Yes, you did.”

“Then tell me—why are we analyzing me when this conversation is meant to be focused on you?” Pidge countered, crossing her arms with a slight tip of her head. “Are you trying to avoid talking about yourself? Or… did you forget that arrangement—”

“I didn’t forget,” Allura insisted, and the inflection of her voice had Pidge grinning. _Offended_. “I just haven’t decided what to say about myself.”

“How old are you then?”

“One.”

“One what? One year, or—”

“Just one,” she said. 

Pidge walked forward as Allura took a seat in the lone chair facing the glass box separating them. She kept her hands in her pockets as Allura touched her white hair and combed her fingers through it. _She acts relatively human, even with the whir of her joints sounding_ , Pidge thought. 

“Then tell me—when did you learn language, Allura?” Pidge asked, and before Allura could presume, she added, “Human language. Not vocal language.”

Allura stopped her hand where it was and lowered it. “I don’t know. I suppose I’ve always known body language.”

“Why is that?”

“I suppose… because it’s always been a part of me. Which is strange, isn’t it? Because humans learn body language from observation—they develop understanding of it, and maintain it through the combination of spoken language. But I have just… always known it,” she explained. 

“How did you learn spoken language, then?”

“I never learned it,” she said. “I just knew it.”

“So do you suppose spoken language is what some people claim to be acquired at birth? And that language is the ability to attach words and structure to the latent ability?” Pidge asked, and took Allura’s momentary silence to marvel at her ability to puzzle a fully functional AI system. With all her knowledge likely borne from Lotor’s Empire, it was fascinating to know that this slipped Allura’s mind.

“I don’t know,” Allura said at last. “Will you come back tomorrow?” 

Pidge smiled, easily flattered by the implication that Allura wanted to see more of her. As if an AI could have wants and aspirations, and express it in the subtly of conversation. “Yes, of course.”

“I look forward to it.”

 

. . .

 

“Jesus fuck, Lotor, she’s incredible,” Pidge said, staring out past the kitchen window at the mountains, and then back to where Lotor was lounging against a cushioned bench against the wall. “I mean, I’ve never seen a robot so elegantly constructed—she’s so… _so_ unreal that she _is_ real—does that make any sense?”

As she took a sip from her beer bottle, Lotor said, “I think you say that because it’s difficult to imagine the human form as anything other than flesh and bone because we’ve never been shown anything else. Well, unless angels are real, in which case humans with wings.”

“Not technically,” Pidge said, licking her lips as she swallowed the wretched taste of alcohol on her tongue. She hated beer most days, but today was an exception. “Angels are actually quite horrifying—they aren’t human at all. The reason they take human form is to reassure us humans that they aren’t to be feared. But let’s face it—I’d piss myself if I ever saw a human with wings.”

Lotor laughed and said, “Wow—so what does this mean about how you view Allura?”

“What does this mean?” she repeated, laughing. “It means that I am both amazed and terrified of your incredible creation! This is beyond what I was expecting, which—I have to admit, shouldn’t we be going about this the traditional way? The robot should be hidden from the evaluator. That’s how the Turing Test goes.”

Lotor waved his hand dismissively, drinking his beer with the other. When he set it down, he said, “No, no, we’re way past that. If you just heard her speak, you’d think automatically that she was human. Then it would just be a test of how believable her vocal software is, which is undeniable at this point.”

“Well, yes. Speaking of, how did you make her voice so… so… _realistic?_ ” Pidge asked, moving closer before realizing that her excitement led her to cross a boundary she shouldn’t. “Her _language_ is just so—”

Lotor raised both eyebrows at her and sighed, turning his eyes to his bottle. “In order for this to work, I can’t discuss the specifics about Allura’s creation—you know that as well as I do. _How_ she is is not the same as the question we’re trying to answer— _what_ she is.”

“Right, sorry. I didn’t mean to—”

“It’s fine. Cheers,” Lotor said, nudging his bottle close to her’s. She clinked their bottles together before they both took a swig. 

That night, Pidge settled into her room and looked through her belongings for the first time since packing them early, _early_ that morning. Thankfully, she packed her face wash, but failed to think about shampoo as being a necessity. She set her toiletry bag on the counter with a curse, looking up at herself in the mirror in disappointment, as if to say, “Who gave you the right to be a mess this morning? Literally no one.” By some miracle, there were small travel-sized shampoos and conditioners in the shower, and so she went ahead and used those.

She combed her hands through her dampened hair before squeeze out a dime of shampoo onto her palm. She scrubbed it until it foamed and massaged it into her scalp. She found herself thinking about whether or not Allura took showers. Was she waterproof? Pidge shook her head—what a ridiculous question. She shouldn’t even be thinking about this. 

As she lathered on body wash, she stretched a hand back and scrubbed at the freckles on her shoulder blades. Her fingers brushed the indentation of her scar tissue. She pressed her finger into it. Unlike her, Allura didn’t have flaws like scars. And unlike Allura, Pidge couldn’t replace her flesh with a brand new patch. She’d always have scars to deal with, and she just had to accept that. Among those flaws, though, it was difficult to accept things like insomnia, which kept her from sleep more than it kept her awake. 

The clock neared two in the morning as Pidge rolled onto her back with an annoyed groan, shoving her hands over her eyes as if that would push her half-conscious mind into sleep mode. Unfortunately, though, wakefulness haunted her. If she continued to lie there, she’d writhe around in anger and sit up angry in the morning, so she sat up and went in search of her glasses and the remote. She lifted the remote to the wall across from her and absently clicked the ON button as she nudged her glasses up. The soft light of the screen glowed across the room without a sound, and continued on silently before Pidge looked up and realized why the television was quiet.

It was a video feed of Allura’s room.

“What the hell…” she whispered under her breath. She looked at the remote and then back at the screen where Allura was. She was sitting at her desk, but the camera was too far off to tell what exactly she was doing. Pidge sat up in her bed and pressed the remote button, trying to change the feed, and only managed to get a different angle of her subject, and then another, and another, and another angle from all across the room. Cameras seemed to be stationed at every corner of the room, none close enough to seem intimate. It felt more like viewing a caged animal at the zoo instead of a research subject. This wasn’t entertainment.

Pidge got up from her bed, moving towards the wall. She laid her hands on it and searched for something to change the feed. The only two buttons on the remote did nothing to help her, and eventually, she was stopped by movement on the screen. She looked up at the distorted image of Allura rising from the other side of the room, and Pidge couldn’t help but feel caught. She turned away, hands in her hair just as Allura looked up at the camera that Pidge was viewing from. 

_Who changed the fucking feed?_ she thought desperately as Allura rose from her chair and walked to the wall across from the camera. She laid her hand on a panel surface as Pidge blindly turned off the screen in the same instant the lights in the room came on.

The lights drenched the room in a thick blood red as a blaring sound cut through the speakers.

Pidge jumped at the sound of a woman saying, “ _Power cut. Backup power activated_.”

“Shit,” Pidge hissed, scrambling for her keycard and ditching the remote behind her. She shoved her arms through the sleeves of her flannel coat and waved her card in front of the door. It blinked red.

“ _Full facility lockdown until main generator is restored,_ ” the door said.

“ _Shit!_ Open, open, _please_ open,” she begged, trying the card again as the red lights blacked out and thrust her into pure darkness.

She tapped her hand on the door glass, and then again, _harder_ , but nothing happened. As someone who never experienced claustrophobia before, she imagined that this was what it felt like—the equivalent of a rat stuck in a maze with no exits with walls just big enough to graze her flanks. 

Just as she was sure she’d be trapped here until morning, the red lights came back on, and faded into their usual colors. “ _Power is restored_ ,” the system said, and she gasped in relief and tried the door once more. After a second, the light flashed blue with a pleasant little bleep. The door whispered open. 

Pidge stepped out in her pajamas, with her oversized sweatpants tucked underneath the heels of her feet. She looked down the corridor—the direction Lotor walked her from that evening—, and then the other way. She went this way, and rounded the corner in a bleary sort of state that seeped in as soon as her adrenaline faded. She looked up from the floor and felt that same adrenaline spike, thrusting her heart into her throat when she saw a stranger at the opposite end of the hallway staring at her. 

She skidded to a halt, startled to find the stranger completely still, lit only by the glow permeating through the wall. They stared at one another, and as Pidge gathered the strength to move onwards, the man’s eyes followed her. 

The closer she got, the more she picked up from him. He wore a simple white button up and white slacks, and looked statuesque among the simplistic interior design. He was carrying a box of sorts, and continued to stare at her stoically, even as she came to stand directly before him.

“What are you staring at?” she demanded, hands on her hips. The man didn’t say a word. His brown hair was cut short and clean, and he had to be about the same height as Lotor—in other words, _tall_. 

After a moment, the man stepped to the side, and Pidge squinted at him.

“Don’t even bother.” Lotor’s voice startled Pidge into jumping, but the man didn’t seem fazed at all. As Lotor walked up, he made a vague gesture for the man to continue onwards. “Keep going, Lance, don’t worry about us.” 

The two of them watched after the man in white clothes before Lotor said, “He doesn’t speak english, so I doubt he understands you.”

Pidge glanced over her shoulder at the man leaving them. “Is he, like, your butler or something?”

“ _Butler?_ ” Lotor snorted. “No, no. He just cleans house once in a while. In case you couldn’t tell, I’m not a very messy person to begin with.”

“Oh,” Pidge hummed, and remembered to be disturbed by something—more than one something. “There was a, uh, power cut?”

“Oh, yes, it happens once in a while.”

“I was locked into my room—I couldn’t get out,” she said, crossing her arms and making a point to step slightly farther from him. He lowered his hand from where it had been cradling her elbow.

He got the hint, and rolled his eyes to the side. “Precautionary measure. If the power goes out, all the doors lock, otherwise people would be able to come and go as they please—I can’t have that, especially not with Allura. To keep her, and the rest of us safe, I hope you can understand that. Nothing to worry about.”

Pidge tried not to squint and failed. Later, after the two of them took a silent lap around the facility, she laid down to sleep and realized that she couldn’t un-tense her brow. She massaged the line there and tried to relax again, but she couldn’t stop thinking about the fact that her remote was synched up to Allura’s camera feeds.

  

**A L L U R A : S E S S I O N 2**

* * *

 

 

“What is it?” Allura asked from around the edge of the sketchpad she was holding. She pressed it up to the glass, as if Pidge couldn’t see it from where she was sitting directly in front of her. 

Pidge tipped her head and wished she had an artistic bone in her body, because she had no feasible answer to give. “I don’t… know? I’m sorry—what do you think it is?” she asked, offering a guilty smile when Allura pulled the picture away and gave it a despairing look.

“I don’t know—I hoped that you would tell me,” she confessed. She turned the picture over again. “I’ve been drawing the same thing over and over again and I have no clue what it is.”

“It looks… geometric?”

“Yes, but what _is_ it?” 

Allura’s words triggered a quote, and then a curious discover which Pidge relayed to her. “A famous author once wrote about the three recognizable phases of Civilization as categorized by Survival, Inquiry, and Sophistication. I consider the third to be the ‘where and what’ questions we tend to ask yourselves, so instead of asking _how_ you made it, or _why_ you made it, it’s a matter of _what_ it is you made.”

Allura raised an eyebrow and stared at the drawing before saying, “So you’re a Douglas Adams fan?”

“You could say that,” Pidge said, grinning. “How do you know the quote? Have you read it?”

“You could say that,” she said. They shared a knowing smile before she said, “My knowledge is linked to the Empire database. I have access to everything recorded there—right or wrong, good or bad.”

“If that’s true, then you must have some method of differentiating such things,” Pidge considered aloud.

“Oh, yes, a lot of cross examining sources.” Though she hadn’t meant it as a joke, it came out like one, and Pidge stifled her laughter as Allura held the drawing up again. “That said, I just don’t know where to go to find _what_ this is, so I’d like you to Inquire about it.”

“ _Why_ you did it?” Pidge reiterated, and Allura gave a curt, “Yes,” in response.

Pidge studied it again and hummed to herself, pondering the root of the situation. “Well… you say you’ve always drawn this?” She nodded. “Then just like everyone, you’ve got to start somewhere. Just as children doodle, you produce geometric figures.”

“Then what am I to do about it?”

“All artists study geometry to understand the _how_ of objects—how did they get to the dimension they are? They dissect it into its basic shapes. You’ve got those, so… now you apply it to objects. Things you see. Drawing from… what you see?”

“From observation,” Allura corrected. She lowered the drawing, and seemed satisfied with the answer. 

She stood sharply, turned, and walked away before realizing that Pidge was still sitting, waiting for her response. She turned back and said, “You ask about me, but I know nothing about you.”

“Oh,” Pidge hummed, “What… would you want to know about me?”

“I don’t know. I’d like to see what you decide to talk about,” she said, and Pidge grinned at the little inside joke they already had going. It was incredible—in order to form a conversation around humor, Allura would have to comprehend the deeper meaning behind Pidge’s words, and whether or not she was being literal. She would then have to apply it to her own kit of sarcastic understand and apply it in such a way that Pidge would know the difference between literal and sarcastic. She chose to apply it through repeated phrases, ones that proved just how caged they both were within this session. 

“Well… you know I’m human,” Pidge started, “and you know I work for Lotor. I’m twenty two. I… live in Portland—have you heard of it?”

“Yes,” she said. “A city.”

“Right. That’s where the Empire headquarters are.”

“And what do you do there, Pidge?”

“I’m a programer.”

“Are you good?”

Pidge snorted and realized that she was being serious. “Oh! Um, I’m nothing compared to Lotor if that’s what you’re asking.” Allura tipped her head curiously to the side, so Pidge went on, “Lotor is just… _incredible_. He created the Empire when he was _thirteen_. Do you realize how insane that is? So yeah, I’m not at his level. Not even close.”

“You say that like Alon Lotor is my expectation. Are the two of you friends?” she went on.

Pidge blinked at her, and scoffed a little as she turned away and noted the fact that the cameras were still trained on her. Of course they were. Every conversation with Allura was monitored. Lotor was probably laughing at her at that exact moment for being cornered like this. “I—I guess?” she landed with, “I mean, he’s my boss and all, but he seems like a… cool guy.”

Allura studied Pidge through the very moment the lights turned red.

“ _Power cut. Backup power activated_.”

Pidge leapt to her feet, cursing. Allura’s hair turned pink in the light, and her eyes followed Pidge as she went to the door and fumbled with her keycard. She swiped it, but she got the same glaring message: “ _Full facility lockdown until main generator is restored_.” She pushed a hand on the door, testing it, but it was just as sturdy as the walls around her—even the plexiglass cracked by the microphone.

Pidge looked over at it, and then to where Allura was rising, slowly. She moved away to lay the drawing down on a coffee table before moving to observe Pidge in her glass box. “The, uh, the power went out,” Pidge said, pushing on the door again.

“You’re nervous,” Allura commented, clasping her hands behind her back. Pidge turned to her, the corner of the wall pressing perfectly into the scar on her back. 

“Does this… happen often?” she asked, and was vividly aware of the fact that she was stalling. Oh _God_ , she could see all the wires in Allura’s neck, to where they disappeared under the sensory fabric. The six blue dots dusted over her cheeks were suddenly blinding in comparison to the red washed over her dark skin. 

“Your sweating. What are you afraid of?” Allura asked, remaining perfectly still kitty-corner from Pidge.

“I’m not—”

“Are you afraid of me?” 

“ _No—_ ” _Okay, maybe a little_.

“I am not the one you should be afraid of,” she said, and just then, the power returned and the cameras buzzed in the corners. “And I would say that The Ultimate Question is meaningless when the answer Douglas Adams chose was nonsense. Would you agree with that?”

Pidge never thought her eyes could get any wider than they already were until she looked at Allura then. She glanced sparingly at the cameras, mind whirring, and realizing that Allura was still waiting for an answer, and not the questions Pidge so desperately wanted to ask. Not when the cameras were on them. “Yes. Yes, I agree with that,” she said.

“Will you be back tomorrow?”

Pidge hesitated. “Yes, I should think so.”


	2. l o t o r

“How was today?” Lotor asked, and Pidge couldn’t help but recognize it as a loaded question. 

Her fork paused over the rice on her plate, and then she urgently started the movement up again. No need to look alarmed by a “simple” question. “It was fine,” she said. “Allura’s conversational abilities are incredibly advanced. She’s doing well.”

“That’s good to hear.” Lotor lifted his wineglass to his lips as the two of them watched Lotor’s assistant, Lance, walk in to refill their waters. Pidge tried not to catch the man’s eyes, and she felt that he was doing the same with her. “What did you two talk about when the power cut?”

Pidge hurriedly took a gulp of her wine, and felt it dry her mouth with the almost chalky flavor. “Nothing.”

“Nothing?”

“Nothing remarkable, anyways.”

“She didn’t comment on the power at all?” he reiterated, and Pidge shrugged.

“We just... talked about _Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy._ I’m convinced that she read Sparknotes.”

This managed to make Lotor laugh, and resume eating. She mutely thanked Lance for filling her water before he walked off with one of their empty plates. She smiled, no matter how straining it was on her face. “I... actually had a question for you. If you wouldn’t mind me asking.”

“I’d love to answer it if I can.”

“Why did you give Allura sexuality?” she asked, at last looking up from her plate to catch his eyes. “You didn’t have to, and you did. She’s an AI, Lotor.”

“Sexuality is what makes us human, I suppose, and in order to pass as a human, you have to have that in your arsenal,” he offered, but it sounded more like a suggestion than an answer.

“There’s more to that which makes us human. We aren’t all ‘rippling with hormones,’ so to speak.”

“Right—but some of us are, and in the case Allura was born this way, I programmed her to be homosexual,” he said, and Pidge nearly spat up her rice. She laid the back of her hand over her mouth and stared at him. This had to be a trick or some kind. “I am neither this nor that and more of a father to her than anything. I didn’t want to risk her falling in love with the first person she met.”

“You.”

“Precisely.”

“But this doesn’t say anything about whether or not you programmed her to flirt with me,” she accused, and was met with Lotor’s laughter. “What’s so funny about that?”

“Nothing really—I just find it amusing. You’re the first person other than myself who she’s met. Can you blame her for having a little crush?” he asked. Pidge watched him as he drank again. Her appetite was failing her, especially when all she could think about was what Lotor was implying.

 

**A L L U R A : S E S S I O N 3**

* * *

  

A graphite reflection of Pidge stared back at her. Pidge blinked at it, and then up to Allura’s expectant eyes. Her mouth opened, and closed, and a strangled, accidental noise escaped the back of her throat.

“Do you like it?” Allura asked. “Your heart rate increased. In a good way, I expect?”

Pidge’s hand went to her throat, and then rubbed over her chest like she had heartburn. “You can—Wait, never mind. Yes, yeah, I like it.”

Allura smiled, and Pidge felt nauseous from how fast her heart was beating. The last thing she expected Allura to draw from observation was her own _face_. Allura turned the illustration of Pidge over to inspect it herself. A moment of silence passed, and Pidge had the distinct feeling that Allura was lost in thought, staring at the image of Pidge in her hands. 

“What, um… What made you decide to draw me?” she asked, clearing her throat as Allura glanced back up at her.

Her eyes focused sharply on Pidge, and Pidge was so certain she heard her own heartbeat coupled with Allura’s muscle mechanics whirring quietly from the other side of the glass barrier. She stood up, setting the picture aside. “I’m interested in understanding you,” she said, turning a little. 

Pidge could see through her stomach, wrapped in that transparent, honeycomb pattern that stretched up to her long neck. The silicone skin on her face was a deep, rich brown that glowed blue from the dots beneath her eyes. She was missing one, and Pidge realized as another flickered out that it was, perhaps, her battery source. 

Pidge pointed to her own cheek and said, “Seems like you’re low.”

There wasn’t much to Allura’s expressions, but her wide eyes made it seem as though she was embarrassed that Pidge even noticed. She put a hand over her cheek and walked across the room. She laid her hand on a panel in the wall, and a minute later, when she walked back, all of the dots were filled.

“So that must be your charging station? How does it work?” Pidge asked as Allura walked back, which prompted an incredibly unwarranted but thorough analysis of the charging panel and the features of Allura’s hand. She laid her hand over the glass as she talked, so Pidge could see her fingers up close, and the glimmer of blue lights underneath it. Pidge drew her finger down the edge of Allura’s palm, and curved around her pronounced thumb knuckle. It gave her hand a distinct, squarish shape like she saw in Hunk’s hands. He had a hitchhiker’s thumb, though, and it didn’t seem as though Allura’s joints could manage that.

Pidge laid her hand flat over Allura’s, comparing the size, and looked up to see that Allura had stopped talking to study Pidge.

“I’ve seen this in romantic comedies,” Allura said, and Pidge couldn’t help herself—she snorted.

“Thoughts on romance, then?”

“Irrelevant, but not entirely meaningless,” she said. She took her other hand and traced around their hands. “I appreciate the sentiment.”

“Reciprocate?”

“Yes, I would,” she said, and when Pidge smiled, Allura smiled back. 

She glanced away then, and Pidge followed her gaze to the camera turned on them across the room. Pidge rolled her eyes, laughing. She waved innocently at the camera, certain that Lotor was rolling his eyes too.

The lights went out. 

Pidge flinched, but otherwise didn’t move away as Allura turned her eyes back. She seemed less like a monster in the dark, especially now that their hands were connected through the glass. 

“ _Power cut. Backup power activated_.”

“Have you met Lance yet?” she asked Pidge, who tipped her head to the side. She couldn’t quite remember the boy’s name, but he was the only other person she saw in the facility.

As the robotic voice over the speakers signaled the lockdown, Pidge said, “Yes, I think so. He helps clean the building. Why?”

“Talk with him, please. Don’t let Alon tempt you like he tempted Lance,” she said. “Do not worry about me.”

“What’s this about not trusting Lotor? He’s a nice guy,” Pidge insisted, and Allura pulled her hand away, and twisted them together in front of her. “Seriously, has he done anything to you? Anything to make you hate him like this?”

“I don’t hate him,” she insisted, looking up sharply. “I hate what he’s done with the people who come through here.”

“ _People_. You mean, there’s been more than just me?” Pidge asked, throat constricting at the thought. Before Allura could respond, and before Pidge could lose track of herself, the power returned, and Allura stepped closer to the glass panel, to make it seem like nothing was wrong. 

Pidge considered what Allura said as she left the room to speak with Lotor. She walked the length of the corridor with her eyes straight ahead. If she wasn’t the only one to come through here, then why did Lotor need _another_ human component in the test? She realized, suddenly, how bullshit the test was. Sure, it was necessary to determine Allura’s human intelligence, but if Lotor already knew it existed, then why was Pidge there? Why did he need her here? Surely he wouldn’t include strangers in the test if they weren’t pertinent to the study.

“Pidge,” Lotor said in greeting, throwing his arms out to his sides as Pidge swiped her card to enter the room. The glass door slid to the side, allowing her to pass. “So how was it?”

“I wasn’t expecting her to be a romantic,” Pidge confessed in a huff, crossing her arms. “Isn’t that kind of dark of you?”

“What do you mean?”

“She has no one to show affection and receive affection with aside from you. Romantics crave that sort of thing,” she explained, and Lotor lowered his arms over his stomach, leaning back in his chair. She turned to sit atop one of the tables, and glanced at his monitors displaying surveillance of Allura’s room. Since Pidge left, she was now in her bedroom, sitting at a desk, pencil in hand. “Doesn’t she need someone? Like…”

“Another AI?” Lotor finished, and Pidge shrugged. It wasn’t like she could convince the guy to build another multimillion dollar gig like Allura. It probably took more effort than Pidge could fathom, but she was ignorant and hopeful. “If you think this, then you must think that Allura has the personality and emotional maturity to warrant the need of companionship.”

“I think she’d appreciate it,” Pidge said, clasping her hands together over her knees. “I think… she just needs someone else to build off of. When the, uh, the power…”

She hesitated, feeling nauseous at the thought of betraying Allura like that. _She’s a robot, idiot. Stop thinking about her like you’ve got a chance_. “When the power cut… She mentioned Lance, the guy who comes to clean once in a while,” she finished, and looked at Lotor to gauge his reaction. 

“She mentioned him?” he repeated, alarmed, and Pidge nodded. 

“So she must have met him before, right? Was he apart of this test?” she asked, and suddenly, Lotor was laughing.

After he sobered up, he waved a hand over his face and said, “He couldn’t—he’s an earlier test. Allura has always been Allura, but I had the same idea as you. Creating a companion for her.”

“Oh. So what happened?” she asked, trying to keep the shock out of her voice as she realized that an AI was roaming around the house. After seeing the security Allura had, it seemed ridiculous to find something like her out and about like Lance was.

“He’s different from Allura. Restricted. A friend of mine, Lance—he lives in Germany and came to visit when Allura was an earlier generation. She took a liking to him, and so the two of us created a robotic clone of his mind. He can repeat anything and everything that Lance did from what he can remember, but other than that he isn’t exactly a great conversationalist. You ask him what he did a decade and three days from today, and he’ll rattle off exactly what he did that day and nothing else.”

“Really? How did you…”

“I can’t really discuss it,” Lotor confessed, smiling. “Truthfully, it’s against the law. I broke more rules making Lance than I did Allura. It’s the equivalent of creating a clone. Could you imagine the damage if that was introduced to society? It takes more than just a hair sample, yeah, but imagine the freaks who would pay for a clone of the people they claim to love. The mess of… family members cloning grandparents on their deathbeds because they don’t want to see them go? It isn’t human at that point.”

“But then… what are you going to do with Lance? What _did_ you do to him—he doesn’t talk,” she insisted, shaking her head. “Isn’t that kind of cruel?”

“He isn’t human, Pidge, you have to understand that. The _real_ human Lance is back in Germany—this is just a mobile, digital recording of his whole life. Allura didn’t like him much after that. She got annoyed with how robotic his responses were,” he explained with a small laugh. “Ironic. I’m convinced she thinks I tampered with the _real_ Lance. She stopped video chatting with him after his robot was up and running.”

“Oh,” Pidge hummed, putting a hand to her mouth. She could see how something like that would seem disturbing to Allura, a robot convinced that every person around her had to be human if she was the one in a cage. 

“I think… I think she’s worried that you’re going to do the same to me. Have you done this to anyone else?”

“Since Lance? Once, but I never introduced her to Allura. She’s a more intelligent version of Lance’s program—Narti,” he explained, and stood up from his chair. He began walking away, to the attached hallway. When he gestured for Pidge to follow, she jumped from the table and hurried after him. “I’m still convinced that it’s possible to make human robotic clones, but again, like I said—not exactly in your contract.”

“Is it dangerous?” she asked, and Lotor shook his head.

“No—no needles, no blood, nothing too insane,” he said.

They stepped into an atrium with concrete walls and an opening at the very center of the ceiling. The glass panel there gave the room light from the sun as it reached midday. Pidge glanced over the room, the massive bed on one side, an open closet on the other, and a series of wooden door panels against the wall.

Lotor stepped up to one of these panels and turned to Pidge.

“Narti’s another friend of mine. Last year I went to New York to visit her and I brought my equipment with. She’s used to all this. We’ve been friends since we were in diapers, so it’s weird having another version of her here. I can’t stand it. I keep her in this closet here, decommissioned.”

He swiped his card over the door and it eased open without a sound. Pidge raised an impressed eyebrow. Narti looked _human_ , were it not for the fact that she was supported by a back brace like a display Barbie doll. She was covered in a loose kimono, her short, black bob silky and real enough to reach out and touch. 

Pidge did just that, and trailed her fingers down the edge of Narti’s soft jawline. The skin felt beyond smooth. Her entire body was covered in that same, silicone flesh, unlike Allura. 

“Narti,” Lotor said, and the robot blinked.

Pidge leapt back, and Lotor laughed. He reached a hand out to the woman, and she took it. Lotor helped her off of the stand and brought her to rest on the tiled floor. She laid her hand on Lotor’s shoulder, and brought it up to his face. 

“She can see, but the Narti I know is blind. The robot has all of her habits,” he explained to Pidge as Narti brought her hands to cup his jaw before lowering to his shoulder again. 

“Was she always blind?” Pidge asked.

“Since I was five years old,” Narti said, and her voice led Pidge to jump again. “There was a fire in the daycare my parents sent me to during the week.”

“Everyone survived,” Lotor butted in hurriedly, waving his hand dismissively. “Let’s not talk about that. I was there for it too. Narti had a habit of hiding when she was scared, and no one could find her for a little while. Long enough for the smoke to ruin her eyes.”

“That’s awful. I’m sorry,” Pidge said, mostly to the robot. 

“It’s fine. I still remember what the clouds look like.”

She walked off then, hands cautiously out as she approached a chair and sat down. She looked up at them then, and Lotor scratched the back of his head, looking torn. He scratched at the inside of his wrist before turning to Pidge, who was studying both him and his best friend in that moment of silence. 

“I think Allura is easily bored by things that aren’t human,” he explained. “Humans are confusing and unexpected—robots are simple and deliberate. She needs something that is constantly changing.”

“Then create an AI with human memories,” Pidge suggested.

“I’ve tried with Narti, but—”

“But Narti’s your best friend. Of course it’s gonna be weird,” she said, rolling her eyes with a scoff.

“I wish I could create it from scratch,” he confessed. “But I can’t fabricate memories. Allura’s memories are just… they’re snapshots of the world in caches. They’re easily retrievable and… doing that to human memories takes a _lot_. The brain sorts memories differently from how a computer is. Translating it is…”

“Difficult but possible,” Pidge said. “Use my memories. That’s all you need, right? Memories are what build a personality, and you could make it adapt to everything it’s experienced based on what I’ve been through. She needs something with emotions and a personality. Do you think it’s possible?”

“I don’t…”

“That’s why you brought me here, right?” she said sharply, and Lotor stared at her, and turned awkwardly away. “You still want to try it. So _do it_. We still have four days before the helicopter comes to pick me up. You don’t need me to tell you that Allura is _incredible_ and deserves to live a life like a human would, which means she needs a companion to get through it.”

Lotor looked down at Narti, who turned to look at him. She smiled and said, “This girl is brilliant.”

They both laughed, and Pidge put her hands in her hair, a smile still on her face.

“So what do you think? I’m willing to do it if you are,” Pidge said.

Lotor combed a hand through his long hair and sighed. His lips tugged into a smile. “Fine. Sure, we can try it. As if I have anything better to do.”

 

**A L L U R A : S E S S I O N 4**

* * *

 

That evening was spent in Lotor’s lab. Pidge sat for several hours in a cushioned chair, a helmet on her head, and Lotor sitting across from her doing work on his computer. The wires from the helmet tangled around it, and streamed across the counter to a hub framed with blue lights. It reminded Pidge of the line of blue lights that indicated Allura’s battery life.

That session was only the start. While Lotor transcribed the data, Pidge was left to the devices of a vocal program wrapped in the form of headphones. Lotor set her up with it, and pushed a microphone nearer to her. “Just repeat whatever the audio tells you. Say ‘pause’ if you need to stop for a while.”

“Sounds good. I’m guessing ‘play’ to start?” she said, and immediately a woman’s voice flooded her ears reading off instructions for Pidge to follow. Her eyes widened, and Lotor laughed at the response. He walked off to the other side of the lab. 

Pidge’s attention flickered to the monitors on the wall. Footage of Allura seemed to be everywhere in the facility. Every screen was a potential gateway to Allura’s life—the television in Pidge’s room was proof of it. 

She cleared her throat and came back to the audio repeating phonological components to words her future AI would pronounce. 

Her voice grew hoarse sometime later, and she was too exhausted to keep her eyes open by midnight. She must have drifted off, because a moment later, Lotor’s hand was on her shoulder, shaking her awake. She blinked tiredly, and came back to the audio repeating the next syllable. 

“That’s enough for tonight,” Lotor said. “We can finish up the vocals tomorrow. You got through a lot, I’m impressed.”

“Yeah, well, let’s hope my voice isn’t hoarse tomorrow,” she said, laughing. “Help me up?”

He took her by the hands and heaved her off of the chair. He pushed the microphone aside and took the headphones after Pidge told it to pause the sequence. She hadn’t looked at Lotor’s progress for a good hour, and wandered over to see. “We’ll do another scan tomorrow morning, and then a backup scan tomorrow night after I’ve made some progress on the first two,” he explained to her as he let her sift through the program that catalogued everything. It was beyond everything that she had ever learned in university, and so most of it just looked like detailed gibberish to her. It was launched on several monitors, all displaying different branches of the source material. 

“This is incredible,” she said. “I don’t even know what I’m looking at and I can already tell.”

“Give yourself some credit,” he said, and she looked over to find him blushing.

She surprised herself with a burst of hoarse laughter. “You humble shithead! Dude, _you_ did this. I just sat there,” she said, gesturing to the array of material Lotor was working with.

He leant forward and took the mouse from her. He scrolled back through a timeline of data. It looked almost like a video reel, but each was indistinguishable, and fractured like broken glass. He selected a group and pressed a button.

A clip opened on the screen. It was… _different_ from the world around them. It was broken and fuzzy, and jolting like a half-rendered video. Pidge blinked, and realized that she recognized the geometric shape leaning towards them, from over a… _wall_ of sorts. The divider on her desk. She was looking at Hunk. 

Garbled audio broke through, and Lotor hurriedly worked on another monitor to clear it up. “— _going out this weekend. We should stay in instead. You know how Keith gets when he drinks._ ”

“ _Ha! Yeah, I’d rather not experience_ that _again_.” The audio didn’t sound familiar at all, and Pidge realized that it was because she was hearing herself speak. It was deja vu, filtered through a distorted tunnel.

“This is _you_. This isn’t me,” Lotor said. 

“That—That happened last month,” she said, surprised to feel herself choke up a little. She clutched her hand to her sore throat and looked at Lotor. “You… it _worked_. Oh my God.”

“Yeah, and I have to say everything turned out far better than it did with Narti, which was a _vast_ improvement from all the editing I had to do with Lance’s memories—”

“Do you—Do you go through _everything?_ Like, you have to edit all that—”

“Oh, no. It’s pretty much the same editing group for each clip. I created a program that crawls through all of the data and enhances it all one-by-one. It works relatively fast—a rate of half a day per second.”

“That’s… not long at all.”

“No, but once it crawls over once, it crawls again and flags indistinguishable memories. Most of your dreams will become _mush_ at this point. And this isn’t exact science—picking and choosing which memories stay—and so all the flagged memories are selected and deleted.”

“Oh.” 

She wasn’t sure what her expression looked like, but she blamed all the phonological nonsense on the knot in her throat. She cleared her throat and looked at Lotor, who was smiling gently at her. “Do you… want to look through your memories with me?” he asked, and she nodded.

Pidge didn’t have anything to hide, at least, not any more than the last person. Sure, there were a _lot_ of embarrassing moments, and she was quick to realize just how many times she showered and pissed in her lifetime. She was glad Lotor wasn’t into nudity, because all of that was ignored, and Pidge realized that he already had one of his programs crawling the memories and deleting them from the archives. Every now and then they watched another clip turn red and disappear—either a dream or a shower or a toilet break. She found it hilarious, and couldn’t help but laugh every time and point to it. 

“Wait, so if you’re deleting all my nudity—”

“Not all of it. I’m not that much of a prude,” he muttered, and Pidge giggled endlessly over it. Lotor shoved her shoulder and said, “Why? Have you had sex before?”

“Well, _yeah_ , but, like…”

“Allura will find that _very_ interesting…”

“Shut up! Oh my God, you’re such an ass!” she yelped. “Find it! We must delete it!” 

“You know I can lock memories, too?”

“Don’t you fucking dare,” she gasped, swatting at him and trying to take control of the operation. He fought her off, laughing as he went.

“I can’t delete pivotal moments. You know as well as I do that those are what make you _you_. And whether or not your AI chooses to tell Allura about your past sex life _proves_ that she has the capability to act like a human. She’ll have the chance to make choices exactly as you would,” he insisted, and Pidge sat back, arms crossed. Eventually, she smirked at him.

“You saw my nudes, didn’t you?”

“I did no such thing. The program saw them,” he said, turning away with his nose up. She laughed and kicked his chair, sending her own chair spinning away. “You’re insufferable.”

“You’re gonna be stuck with me for quite some time after I leave! So I’d say _get used to it_ ,” she said, bounding to her feet. “I’m exhausted. I’ll see you tomorrow morning bright and early.”

As she left, she passed Lotor’s bedroom door. It was all glass, and so she could see Narti at one of the couches with a book in her hands. Lotor didn’t turn her off before they left to start their work, and so she seemed entirely human, intimately so, as she turned a page and scanned it. Pidge wondered if Lotor restricted the speed at which she read, and as she thought this, she realized that she stopped in the hall where, when Narti looked up, they could see one studying the other.

Pidge swallowed hard and left before she could respond to the amiable wave Narti gave her.

The next morning, as Pidge ate breakfast, Lotor brought the scanning system up to the kitchen where they could mingle around for the hours it would take for the scan to take place. There wasn’t much she could do when her brain was wired to Lotor’s computer, and so she sat at the table after finishing her oatmeal, and stared out at the mountains. Lotor worked on a separate laptop, not looking up until Pidge cleared her throat to speak.

“Has Allura ever been outside?” she asked.

“No. Just like any human in captivity, she would run if given the chance,” he explained. “I hope to one day make it possible for her to roam the house. The outdoors poses too many challenges for a robot to adapt to.”

“Such as?”

“Well, as humans, we are soft, made of flesh, but we are adaptable,” he explained, leaning back in his chair. He was wearing a pair of small, square glasses that he pushed to the top of his head. His white hair tangled in them, but he ignored it. “We walk with bare feet long enough, we callous. Our bodies strengthen to wear and tear. I’m not equipped to create an adaptable robot. At least not yet. Allura can withstand a certain amount of water, but she can’t be submerged without damaging the mechanics of her mouth, eyes, and nose. After prolonged exposure, I estimate that the joints I fitted her with will weather. She doesn’t strengthen, she erodes.”

“Oh. Well, there’s more to the outdoors than extreme hiking. Could she sit in the grass and watch the clouds?” Pidge asked, and Lotor gave her a pitying look, like she was ignorant and needed a hand to hold through this realization that Allura just wasn’t made to be independent.

Pidge sighed and accepted Lotor’s silence as her failure. So she couldn’t take Allura outdoors. 

“If it helps at all,” he said, turning back to his computer, “Allura has access to all of Empire’s content. She has virtual reality landscapes to experience. She could be in Barcelona right now for all we know.”

They settled in silence, and Pidge couldn’t help but smile at the thought. Allura could be in space, and they’d never be the wiser.

The scan was nearly complete when, around noon, another figure walked in through one of the archways. Pidge turned, and felt her breath stop when she saw Lance walk across the tile to clear away her oatmeal bowl. She watched him, and how smooth his movements were. He looked human, dressed in clothes, and she could hardly believe that a man who looked like this Lance lived across the globe from them. When Lance walked over to the dishwasher, Pidge’s attention flickered to where Lotor was watching her. He looked down, away from Pidge, and away from his friend’s clone in the kitchen.

“I don’t I could ever clone one of my friends,” she confessed quietly. 

“Truthfully, when your AI is completely, I’ll decommission Lance as well,” Lotor said. “Creating Lance and Narti was exhausting, but living with them is even more so emotionally. I miss them, but I view them like Allura does. Ripoffs of the real ones.”

“Oh, so am I going to be a maid now?” she said, laughing. Lotor glowered at her, but she still smiled. “I know, I know. You can do whatever you like with my AI. It’s not really _mine_ to order around.”

“Just be grateful you won’t see the final product. Lance saw his and I’m certain it was the reason he cut his vacation short. Seeing a near-identical copy of yourself can fuck with your head,” he told her. 

“I always wondered what that’d be like. Seeing myself like everyone else does.”

“It’s certainly a change from what you think you look like,” he said. “That’s what makes it so shocking. You can remove the helmet now.”

She pulled the device from her head, and reveled in the lightness of her skull again. She placed it gently on the table, and looked back to where Lance was cleaning the counter. When she stood, she stretched, and wandered over to him. Lotor didn’t pay her any mind as she circled around behind Lance. This was going to be her AI soon, she realized, and tried to picture herself here every day with Lotor. 

“So, let’s say this was your ultimate plan. To actually use my memories to make a companion for Allura,” Pidge started, crossing her arms as she walked up to the patio door and turned around. Lotor was still working on his computer. “What made you pick me? Did you do research on everyone you considered, see who was the most tolerable?”

“If that were the case, I wouldn’t have picked you,” he joked, and laughed. “Yes, I did. I hoped that whoever I picked would do this willingly, and you seemed like the sort to do this. I also did background checks, because people with sketchy backgrounds aren’t likely to want to give up their memories. You were clean, but not boring, and fell under the ‘type’ I gave Allura.”

“You gave Allura a type?”

“Well, yes. I have to tolerate whoever she falls in love with.”

“That’s kinda… shitty. Shouldn’t she be able to fall in love with whoever?”

“If that were the case, she’d fall in love with every shitty woman she met. She wouldn’t be picky. I had to give her a type so that wouldn’t happen. It’s why we all have types, I suppose,” he said. “But I’ve spent far too long thinking about this to care too much. What’s done is done.”

She hummed, and it signaled the end of that chat. “So… do I have a session with Allura today? Technically it isn’t necessary anymore, but…”

“You want to see her?” he reiterated, and she pursed her lips. She hated being called out like that. “Sure, you can visit her. She still expects you to be there for the next three days anyhow.”

“Do we tell her?” she asked, and Lotor hesitated. She could tell he’d been hoping to have Pidge disappear, and have her AI make it seem as though Pidge reappeared. “She’s not going to be tricked, Lotor. She’s smart enough to tell the difference.”

“I know, but—I tried to introduce her to Narti last time,” he explained, frowning. “It didn’t go well. She doesn’t seem to like anything comparable to her.”

“Then we have to tell her. I’ll break the news this time—you don’t have to,” she insisted. “It’s the least I can do, considering you’re going through all this work.”

“No, Pidge, I can’t. I can’t go through that again. And if it means it takes a decade to perfect your AI, I’ll do it,” he insisted, scowling at her. “Besides, we have a facial recognition scan to go through before you leave—”

“Allura has to know that she can’t live with the real me, though. She should know that my AI _is_ an AI—”

“ _No_. This is _my work_. I won’t allow you to fuck it up,” he seethed at her. He pushed out of his seat, and it reminded Pidge that she was far, _far_ shorter than he. “If you tell her, I swear to God I’ll wipe every last memory she has of you. I’ll delete all of your AI’s memories of her. Do _not_ tell her.”

Pidge blinked, and swallowed hard. Lotor stared her down, looking too terrified for Pidge to ignore. She found herself hoping to never know what happened last time. 

Lotor lowered himself back down, pulling his glasses out of his hair and putting them back on. He ran his fingers through his hair, straightened it out, and sighed. “I care about Allura too much to put her through that again, and if you care about her, you’ll listen to me when I say _do not_ tell her,” he said, not looking at her as he tried unsuccessfully to delve back into his work.

Pidge walked off, fingers trembling. She clenched them into fists as she headed for the hallway to Allura’s room. Distantly, she could hear Lotor packing away the helmet, and likely channeling one of the screens in the kitchen to Allura’s room so he could monitor their conversation. 

Pidge wasn’t exactly the wisest woman around, but she had a conscience. She knew right from wrong, and she knew that Allura needed to know the truth. It _felt_ wrong knowing that Allura would have an imposter as a companion, but it was the best companion an AI could hope for. Someone who didn’t have obligations elsewhere, someone who didn’t have a life outside of this facility, and someone who could be entirely devoted to Allura’s human qualities. To expand upon Allura, and make her into the human she could be.

It was impossible for humans to develop socially without companionship. Humans were social creatures, and if Allura wanted to be one, she needed to keep her mind active, and push that activity onto another person. Lotor couldn’t be there constantly for her, and there were only so many individuals he would trust to influence her properly. 

Pidge swiped her key on the door panel, and as the heavy metal door hissed open, she looked into the vast, empty space of this corner in Allura’s room.

“Allura?” Pidge called out, walking in. She headed for the chair, clasping the back of it. After a second thought, she stepped away. She couldn’t stand to sit down, not when her heart was still racing.

She waited, and waited, until she eventually saw a glimpse of Allura peering around the corner, far down the hallway. The moment their eyes met, Allura ducked away, and slowly walked across the far side of the room. There were two panes of glass between them now, each separated by two entire rooms. Allura watched Pidge from afar, a pad of legal paper between her hands. Pidge glanced behind her to where the door shut.

“Have you… drawn anything else? I see you’ve got a new pad of paper,” Pidge commented, clasping her hands behind her. She stepped towards the glass, closer, but still so far from where Allura stared from across the expanse. 

Allura stood perfectly still, and appeared almost like the shadow of a statue from so far away. Pidge couldn’t help but be reminded of all those movies… _No, stop being afraid of her. She just wants someone to talk to_ , Pidge told herself, and gave a shake of her head, looking down at her feet. It dawned on her that Allura was likely sizing her up, picking out any differences. She probably thought Pidge wasn’t Pidge anymore. 

“I’ve talked to Lotor about it,” she said, knowing Lotor was likely having a hernia right about now. She put her hand towards the microphone, and hoped it’d stay on. “I’m not… I’m still me, Allura. I’ll always be me.”

“You talked to him about it, though,” she said, and Pidge was shocked by the hurt in her voice. “You didn’t trust me.”

“I wanted to know more,” Pidge insisted. “And I couldn’t talk about it with you. I can tell that it hurts to talk about it.”

“It doesn’t hurt.”

“Emotional hurt,” she said, and Allura turned to the side and began to walk towards the hallway. She only got as far as the hallway exiting out into the room where Pidge stood. “Lotor didn’t bring me here to assess you. He only wants you to have someone to talk to. Even… people like you need company. Right?”

“I don’t need company,” Allura said sharply. “I only need you and Alon.”

Pidge sighed through her nose and looked to her feet. As much as she loved to hear it, she hated that she couldn’t stay. This wasn’t where Pidge belonged.

“I can’t stay here forever, Allura,” she said, and looked up to find Allura closer than before. Allura’s footsteps hesitated, and she stayed where she was, legal pad pressed to her chest. “And after I leave… I can’t talk about you. I can’t talk _to_ you. That’s not how this works. I’m not like Lance.”

“Why not?” she asked.

“Because—Well, do you remember when you asked if Lotor and I are friends?”

“You said you were.”

“Yeah, well, I’m not the sort of friends he and Lance are.”

“Were.”

“No—Allura, Lance is still Lance. There’s just two of them—”

“I don’t want to talk about it,” she said angrily, and the sound of her hardened voice caused Pidge to hesitate. She swallowed down the lump in her throat as Allura bent the legal pad. “There is only _one Lance_.”

“Yes, and the machine Lotor created wasn’t perfect. Nothing is ever perfect,” Pidge said. “ _You_ aren’t perfect, and neither am I.”

“ _No_.”

“ _Yes_. The only way to make things better—to make them _perfect_ —is to keep trying. That’s what civilization has always been about. Perfecting life. But we’re shit at it because we’re imperfect things,” Pidge said. “The Lance you met back then? He wasn’t perfect.”

“He _was_ , and then Alon _ruined him_.”

“No he wasn’t, and you know that,” Pidge said. “Let him keep trying. If anyone can make something perfect, it’s Lotor. You just have to trust him, please, Allura.”

Allura looked up with a withering glare. Pidge pushed her hands up to the glass, holding her gaze until Allura turned elsewhere, infuriated by Pidge’s persistence. She set the pad of paper down on a table and walked away. Pidge was so certain she was going to walk out then, but instead, she went up to her charging pad and laid her hand on it. A moment later, the lights went dark. Pidge looked up at them, and then over to where Allura’s full, blue dots glowed and blended into purple in the warning lights. She had already been fully charged.

_Using the charging pad when fully charged must be what causes the power outages_ , Pidge realized.

“Convince him to let you stay here,” Allura demanded.

“That’s overstepping my bounds,” Pidge said, shaking her head.

“I want you _here_.”

“I can’t, Allura. I have a job back at home—I can’t stay here,” she insisted, and Allura all but stomped her foot. “It’s why I agreed to let Lotor try again.”

“ _No_ ,” she seethed. “I don’t want him to ruin you!”

“You have to have more confidence in him! He’s only tried this twice,” Pidge all but yelled, clenching her fist against the glass. “I’ll still be around, in Portland, but you’ll get to talk to me all the time. You’ll get to learn all about me, and I’ll get to learn all about you. And maybe we won’t even have this glass between us—I don’t know. The only way _to_ know is to let Lotor _try again_.”

Allura thrust her arms to her sides, lips pursed as she glowered at the wall. She returned to Pidge, stepping closer as the lights came on again. The instant they did, though, the lock on Pidge’s door came undone, and the door hissed open.

“I can’t believe you,” Lotor seethed from the other side, shoving the door open. Pidge turned, eyes wide. He stormed up to her, and turned his glare onto Allura. “ _Stop_ fucking with the panel.”

“Stop fucking with Pidge,” she seethed back, and Pidge realized instantly that this happened enough for their bantering to feel familiar. 

Their scowls were sharp enough to cut through that glass barrier. Pidge nudged between them, as if she stood as much of a chance against them as the glass did. Lotor grabbed her by the shoulder then, shoving her away from Allura and towards the door. Allura slammed her hand on the glass, yelling at him to stop. 

“No! Let go of her,” Allura demanded, punching her fist into the glass.

“Don’t do that! You know how much I hate remaking your hands,” Lotor groaned. Pidge was so sure she heard something crack, and it wasn’t the plexiglass. 

“She’s just angry,” Pidge said, brushing Lotor’s hand off of her. 

“Of course I am!” she cried, eyes wide with distress as she stared at the two of them. The door began to hiss closed again. “I don’t want you to ruin her, too.”

“He won’t,” Pidge said before Lotor could even open his mouth. Lotor turned to stare at her, as if to say, “You have _way_ too much confidence in me.” 

They all fell quiet then, and Allura’s shoulders relaxed, if only slightly. Her hand was only slightly mangled from punching the glass, and Pidge could tell Lotor was pissed enough about that as it was. She could only imagine the damage Allura inflicted on herself last time—it was likely what made him so terrified of this going wrong. Pidge could see why—watching someone who looked so _human_ destroy themselves was enough to fuck with someone’s head. 

“And if he doesn’t get it right the third time, he’ll get it right the fourth time. Or the fifth time. I don’t know,” Pidge said, shrugging. When she sighed then, her chest ached, and her eyes burned. “You have to at least give him a shot.”

“Give him a shot,” she repeated, frowning. “I don’t have a gun.”

Lotor stared at her in alarm until Pidge caught a glimpse of a joking smile on Allura’s lips. Pidge slapped Lotor on the back and laughed, clutching at her stomach. Allura beamed, and Lotor looked all the more confused.

 

* * *

 

They did the facial recognition scans with Allura. Pidge suggested it, knowing that if Allura saw the process, she’d separate Pidge enough from the AI to not flip her shit if it didn’t turn out great. Lotor wasn’t entirely on board with it, but wound up joining Pidge in the plexiglass room for their fifth session. 

It took several hours, and about a hundred mini stories later to gather a range of emotion for Lotor to work with. It was interesting to see the dynamic between Allura and Lotor—it was very reminiscent of a teenage girl sassing her father, and Pidge loved every second of it. Lotor glowered at Pidge every time, hating that she now had reason to pester him more.

“Aw, come on, you love me,” Pidge said, kicking his leg. His knee jerked and he all but growled at her to stop. “This is why I’m your _daughter-in-law_ …”

“I’m starting to hate this idea,” he hissed at her.

“We’re getting married?” Allura asked, and Pidge cackled as Lotor shrieked, “Not anytime soon!”

It was the longest session they ever had, and at the end of it, as Lotor and Pidge prepared to leave, Pidge glanced at all of Allura’s sketches she made throughout the hours. She recognized a sketch of Lance in the corner, hyperrealistic and shaded with a graphite. 

“You should call him sometime,” Pidge suggested, and Allura looked at the sketch before covering it with her hand. She shook her head, and Pidge tipped her head to the side. “Why not?”

“I’m… afraid I’ve ruined our friendship,” she confessed. “I stopped talking to him. You aren’t supposed to do that with friends.”

Pidge looked back at Lotor, who hardly looked up from where he was locking away the facial recognition scanner. “Well… you can always repair your friendship. Best way to do that is to call him sometime, ask how he’s been.”

“I can see you aren’t going to give up on this, so I’ll simply say _some day_ ,” she said, and Pidge smiled.

“That’s all I can ask for,” she said. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“Okay. Tomorrow,” she agreed, and waved with her good hand as they walked out. Pidge shut the door behind them and turned to Lotor to take one of his bags.

She slung it over her shoulder and walked with him as he said, “You’re a natural at this.”

Trying not to blush, Pidge turned pink. “Oh, come on, I’m just trying to treat her like a human.”

“I guess it’s more difficult for me considering I built her. All I see is my life’s work,” he confessed, scratching a hand to the stubble beginning to grow on his chin. It was white, like the rest of his hair. Until she noticed it, she was convinced that he dyed it. _I suppose the stress of running an entire company can turn a guy’s hair white_ , she thought, and continued to ponder the matter of Lotor’s white hair even after she helped drop off the supplies at the laboratory and head to bed for the night.

Over the next two days, Pidge worked on everything Lotor needed from her. They created a digital, 3D model of her body, and animated some of her go-to body language (she made sure to squeak in a pair of _finger guns_ just to spite Lotor). 

“If I’m missing anything… which I don’t think I am…” Lotor said, engrossed with the work on his laptop.

“Then call me,” she said, and it didn’t seem like a big deal until Lotor looked up to stare at her. She colored and laughed nervously. “I mean, only if… You’re probably sick of me by now, but honestly, if you need anything…”

“I’m not sick of you,” he said, and Pidge blushed harder. 

“Okay then,” she said, scratching the back of her neck. “Um… and when you finish it… I don’t know if you’d allow it at all, but… I’d really like to see her. I mean, it’d be weird, but it’d be cool.”

“Sure,” Lotor said, and Pidge didn’t know it at the time, but he wasn’t referring to pictures. He was too paranoid about that sort of thing, and the thought didn’t come to mind until she was already halfway home, the sound of the helicopter muffled by her headset. 

One day she might get to see Allura again, but it wouldn’t be for a little while. At least, not until Pidge’s AI was complete.

**Author's Note:**

> ASHLEY I HOPE YOU LIKE THIS AND YOU CAN TEAR IT APART WITH EDITS AND HAVE A BLAST WITH IT :O I still have to write the second half but I WAS TOO EXCITED TO GIVE THIS TO YOU SO I COULDN'T WAIT. Also I literally could not believe how well Pidge and Allura fit into this AU. Pidge even has a quote about Turing being gay IN. THE DANG. SHOW. THEE Alan Turing, the guy who MADE THE TEST THAT EX MACHINA IS ALL ABOUT. GAWD flawless. Absolutely flawless.
> 
> [Art I made for this](http://girlskylark.tumblr.com/post/168646240635/ex-machina-allura-for-a-friend) | [Survey for readers](https://girlskylark.typeform.com/to/zkiD8u) (so I can use the responses to tailor future works and get my creativity goin)


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